Editing Gloria-Etalia (section)

===  Account of the Battle of Tsu-Xia, The Glutton Fleet vs The Celestial Empire: GE year 4997 ===

From the Commanding Tent of the High-Lord General Nion San, stationed at the Fort of the Majestic Southern Watchtower by her divine grace Empress Dan Ning, Long May the Skyfather Watch over her. 
 
I, Nion San, of sound mind, dictate this missive following Her Most Divine Wishes to be updated in the situation regarding the defense of our coastal settlements against the threat of the Thrice cursed Great-Fat-One. For Imperial Records ends, it's the Seventh Day of the Third Month of the year 2 of Dan Ning's Blessed Reign. 
 
I was sent to the coastal lands after the devastation of the village of Susu. The guard there, numbering five score strong detachment of Xia's Regional People's Militia, was slaughtered to the last, and of the three thousand people living in the village, two thousand remain unaccounted for and presumed dead, with the rest being found either in hiding in the caves by the foothills near the coast or dead on sight and near it. Evidence piling, my conclusions were inevitable. This was an act of most vile piracy or worst, by terrible Koi-Shi* and in my mission to secure Her Imperial Majesty's Peace in her Most Blessed Reign, I took to myself to convey with Koi-Shi from the Yusixi Island. This glass-man had stood witness, in the past, to similar massacres. He assured me, swearing by his facial hair, that this raid was the doing of a being whose foulness defies belief, known as the 'Big Eater' in the Merchant's tongue. After conveying with Imperial Sages, it was told that the 'Big Eater' was indeed the Great-Fat-One of our fishermen legends. It was known for his terrible deeds, but long believe he left our coasts alone for fear of our Celestial Might. It's clear that if this truce ever existed, it was now violated.  
 
I explain this in the hope that her Divine Grace Empress Dan Ning and the Most Blessed Imperial Office of Requisition will judge my next actions with the proper understanding that they meant not to be wasteful, but necessary. 
 
My investigation led me to believe this raid as a prodding raid feeling the defenses of our Imperial Shores and trusting my senses, I sent scouts to the villages near Susu to collect information from their fishermen about the weird sightings at sea. It was confirmed that there had been more than usual, particularly near the rather large coastal village of Tsu-Xia. Time was wasting and I used my authority to approve a black-seal edit, taking command of the province's workforce from the Agrarian Imperial Administration and Imperial Office of Roads and Bridges, and another to seize control of the Imperial Office of Munitions of the Xia Province. The scribes and officials were displeased, as I am sure Her Divine Grace will have heard. Much work needed to be done. 
 
Three villages were raid after Susu, and Tsu-Xia was left alone. These villages are as listed: Din-Su, Nang-Su, and Ling-Su. Casualties numbered now near the eight thousand civilians and eight hundred soldiers. Her Majesty will have heard I refused to evacuate or reinforce villages, and that is true. I take responsibility for the loss of life, but defend my actions as strictly necessary. These prodding attack brought the gaping maw of the enemy towards Tsu-Xia, like a charging boar. 
 
The size of the enemy would have shaken lesser men to their core, but being Celestial Bred Suoxi virile males, my men stood their ground as the Second Day of the Third Month of the Year 2 of Dan Ning's Blessed Reign, we saw the enemy fleet. Ships numbered over two thousand, and a small island seemed to move closer ashore in the middle of them. This hasn't been the case in other attacks, according to reports, only a couple dozen ships had attacked each village. With me I had the Sixth Crane Legion, the Fourth Crane Legion, and the Third Lion Legion, number fifteen thousand strong among them all. I also had the Xia Provincial Auxiliary Militia, numbered a thousand strong, so we knew, before seeing the enemy, we'd be deeply outnumbered. Tsu-Xia's walls opened fire with their trebuchets, and two ships were sunk by our flaming boulders, yet nothing could stop the tide descending upon it. When the longboats were deployed, perhaps a hundred thousand enemies rowed towards our shores, and from the island, the vilest form of the Great Fate One shambled towards us. I had the city garrison fire their rapid-fire crossbow and while thousand of bolts fled the air and many struck home to our enemies black hearts, the Koi-Shi were simply too many. From the moving island, even more, longboats came, the whole island covered in a dark pathetic Koi-Shi dwelling.  We had not even dented their numbers when they made ashore. 
 
Now if her Divine Grace is unfamiliar with Tsu-Xia, that is understandable. So vast is her domain, knowing it all would be beyond even the Great Divine Empress. Tsu-Xia is the heart of the Xia province and stands in the center of a very large bay. Rocks rise from either side of the bay, and Tsu-Xia sits in the only beach one can land or launch ships from. The valley is surrounded by tall, steep cliffs, and few routes lead down into the walled town from the heart of the mainland. I knew this target would be tempting to our enemy, for there would be nowhere for the fifty thousand men and woman of Tsu-Xia to flee once the raid started. At least not effectively, as they would clog the narrow trails and be slaughtered to a man. Tsu-Xia sea is also peculiar in its shallowness, almost a flatbed no deeper than a hundred feet stretches across the whole bay, and the sea won't become deeper until much further. The ground shook when the island ceases to move, for it had become embanked into the shallows, being over a hundred feet deep. So massive was this enemy vessel, it blocked a lot of the routes of the bay, and until it managed to free itself, it almost entirely corked their fleet inside the bay. 
 
Our rapid crossbows were without ammunition as the first of the Vile Koi-Shi made landing and the enemy island-vessel run aground in the shallows. That's when I had the flag raised. Small skiffs around the bay cut the ropes of the large net I had constructed using the whole province's supply of hemp rope and even needed more commissioned in a hurry. These ropes attached to weighted hooks held our most glorious Turtle-Bombs***. 
 
I used the entire supply of the province and explosions that issues were so vast and so close together, that the steam rose and blocked my view of the bay. Over a thousand Turtle Bombs went out in the space of half a minute, and the bay was covered in hot steam. Later reports said that fish emerged dead over five miles in either direction of the bay. As the enemy fleet disappeared from sight under steam, the great fat creates let out a bellowing roar, and the men on the skiffs kept coming and began singing an unhallowed shanty. That's when I raised my second flag.
 
Three Hundred and Seventy-Five Dragon-Doves were loosened into the enemy. I had them outfitted with whistling ammunition and as expected, the loud whistling of eighteen thousand fire-spears whistling down into the skiffs still between the fleet and the shore drowned out the shanty and some of the enemy numbers covered their ears as they began to bleed. Without their unhallowed magic, when the fire-spears touched the frail rowboats, they were upturned and sunk by impact, tossing the man into the now near-boiling water resulting from the turtle bombs. The enemy numbers greatly diminished yet thousands had made ashore already and were marching across the white sands between the sea and the walls of Tsu-Xia, walking between the warehouses of the harbors and cutting down a thousand militiamen I sent from the gates to fight them at the beach. The militia broke, retreating and I had the gates closed. The enemy rushed to finished the fleeing militiamen, piling themselves by the crowded docks. And that's when I raised the third flag. Archers with flaming arrows peppered the warehouses whose roofs were filled with tar, and the interior filled with dry straw. The great conflagration consumed the land forces of the enemy, and the few survivors fled back towards their boats at the beach. I sent the Crane Legion's cavalry cohorts to cut them off and caught between horse and flame, of the hundred thousand enemies, less than a thousand made it back to their boats. By them, the steam cloud had cleared and I could see the enemy fleet of ten thousand boats was now reduced to a mere three hundred, and those were heavily damaged and likely not well crewed. The Great Fat One did great effort to release his island back and retreat. So I raised the fourth flag.
 
A Hundred Thousand Imperial Gold I requested to pay the Glass-Men proved their worth. The Glass Koi-Shi**** brought us fifty fireships, and I hid them in inlets around the bay. They now swarmed from the sides and spilled their fire upon the island-vessel of the fat one. The shantytown was wet and took many bursts of flames to set it ablaze. But eventually, it did. By them, the Island Vessel stirs violently, shaking the foundations of the shantytown above it and tossing most of it's flaming debris into the ocean. The great fat one burned and even from a mile off in my watching post I could smell its fat burning. It was the vilest thing I ever smelled. The Fireships kept spilling flames and the Great Fat One Island-Vessel moves, trampling and destroying perhaps ten of the fireships in its path to flee. The surviving three hundred ships tried their best to follow the smoking wreckage as their leader bellows filled the bay, but the fireships did still manage to set perhaps twenty of them ablaze. All prisoners were executed and their limbs and heads cut and set on spikes, spaced a hundred paces in between, there was enough spikes to cover the whole shore of the Xia province with warnings for the next pirate who deems to attack Her Divine Grace's Subjects. 
 
With this, I hope to justfiy the use of resources and loss of life by explaining to her Divine Grace that the actions were necessary to properly discourage further inclusions from the Great Fat One in our territory. The Imperial Council seeks to have me executed for the loss of life of civilians and soldiers deliberately sacrificed. if Her Divine Grace deems my actions unjust, I'll gladly take my own life upon her Blessed Command. 
 
With no more to declare I sign
 
Your Forever Loyal, Nion Sang, High-Lord General of Xia Imperial Province of Her Divine Grace Dan Ning of the Celestial Empire.
Dictated and Read. 
 
''*(translator note: Celestial world for foreigner and savage is the same; Koi-Shi.)
 
** (Translator note: Celestial often refer to foreign merchants from the Ecinev league as 'glass-man' even when they trade in other products.)
 
*** (Turtle-Bombs are a Celestial war device, a small clay pot filled with air, explosives and with triggering iron spikes. Submerged, the air causes them to float. When clay breaks from contact with a ship, water touches the alchemy Sinfan, causing the water to boil instantly from the heat released, and the expansion of steam forms a fireless, yet extremely strong explosion. Survivors of the kinetic blast are often boiled alive by the rising steam.)
 
**** (Glass Koi-Shi likely means Ecinevan League foreigners)''